Holiday World does a fair job on its shows but there is room for improvement. The park has four theatres: the standard stage above left, the water stage shown at right, Santa's Corner, and Holidog's Theatre. The water stage is home to a diving show which is put on several times a day. It's a pretty good show and can bear multiple visits. The standard stage houses four different shows, presented in a rotating schedule with about an hour between. They're all typical musical revues and are a long Holiday World tradition. HW calls them Glory Bound (Southern Gospel), Rockin' Country (Country Music), Pitch Perfect (Barbershop Quartet), and RetroActive (1960s, 70s, 80s hits). There's also a Karaoke Hour where guests are invited to get up and sing. Wives and daughters of key employees have performed in these shows, and many locals return year after year to various roles. This gives HW a total of five different shows a day, some performed more than once. By comparison, Indiana Beach has its famous waterskiing show, and Kennywood its diving show. This diving show beats KW's, and while IB's waterskiing performance will be hard to touch, they have nothing to match HW's four stage shows. So on sheer volume, HW has a lot to offer. Grandma and Grandpa can bring the grandkids, turn them loose, and spend their day sampling the food, playing ski ball and watching five different shows. Meanwhile, Santa reads to the kiddies and Holidog and his friends put on a dance party.

The problem is quality. These shows are on the level of a very good high school performance. There's nothing wrong with that, as a modern high school drama or musical department puts on a pretty impressive show. But as Holiday World becomes a world class park, it needs to bring its shows up to that level. Currently, there's not a park in the Midwest which approaches the shows of Busch Gardens, Dollywood or Disney. Admittedly, being located in a rural area makes it more difficult to assemble a professional cast. But it's a problem that needs addressed.

Holiday World's game collection is not as elaborate or historic as that of its older rival parks, but being newer, they're in better condition, easier to keep clean, and easier to keep running. Probably the best of the collection are the ski ball lanes shown here. They're very modern. The surfaces are level and smooth, and the all important rims are straight, sharply edged and stiff. They are far superior to the old, bent, sagging and softened rims of most parks' lanes. Other games at HW are the basketball shoot, duck "pond" (actually a stream flowing past), target throw, ring pitch, ball pitch, frog catapult, and air column. You are forewarned, however, that these games are like all carnival and amusement park games : they're set up to take your money, not give you prizes. Balls that are clearly in have a way of bouncing out, rings have a way of slipping off, and frogs don't land where they're supposed to. Prizes are the usual stuffed cartoon characters. As long as you're playing for fun, you'll get your money's worth. But don't count on hauling Sponge Bob home.